


Around Here Somewhere

by thesleepypanda



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Angst, Flashbacks, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Nuryev is doing his best, Other, Past Abuse, Recovery, Small Fry, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:34:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26185000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesleepypanda/pseuds/thesleepypanda
Summary: “Tell me what to do,” Nuryev says, all earnest sincerity.“Can I—” Juno pauses.What the fuck do you want from me, Juno?I'm not the one that broke you.You have a meltdown anytime I try to help.You’ve been like this since we were kids, Jay.
Relationships: Diamond/Juno Steel, Peter Nureyev/Juno Steel
Comments: 10
Kudos: 280





	Around Here Somewhere

“Dearest, do you mind if I borrow your car? I need to pick up a few things.”

“Knock yourself out,” Juno calls back. He’s nestled under a pile of blankets and unwinding with a stream about insect colonies. The apartment’s warm, they just finished his signature spaghetti, and Small Fry (the three-legged raccoon he rescued, not the mutated rabbit) is perched happily on his lap. 

“Do you have them on you?” Nureyuv calls from the entryway. “I don’t see them on the hook!”

The stream suddenly seems very, very quiet. 

__________

_  
There’s a tightness in Juno’s chest. He rubs his hand across it absentmindedly, as if he could push his worry down by physical force (all while pointedly ignoring how prominent his sternum has become)._

_He’s so stupid._

_There’s a hook by the front door that Diamond installed specifically for him, after they’d had one too many arguments about his absentmindedness._

_He digs through the couch cushions with hands that shake slightly. Why do they only have one car key anyway? When his fifth search still doesn’t yield results, he straightens the pillows back carefully. He’s already in deep enough._

_The thing is, he wasn’t even drunk when he got home. He was thinking about a frustrating case, and obsessively turning the details over and over. When he gets that invested, he has trouble focusing on day to day activities. So, every now and then he leaves the lights on when he isn’t home, or doesn’t turn the deadbolt before they go to bed. And maybe he left the oven on once or twice. But it’s not like he means to._

_The oven. Juno groans as he rubs his hand down his face. When he finally forces himself to look at his watch, his stomach drops. Apparently he’s been looking for the keys for almost two hours, which means he hasn’t even started cooking yet. And he can’t pick anything up because he can’t find his goddamn keys._

_He hears the front door open and resigns himself to the argument that’s coming._

_Diamond expects to be greeted as soon as they get home, so Juno takes a deep breath and walks into the living room._

_“Hey handsome,” they say, flashing a smile. It’s a good sign, but Juno knows how fast moods can change. Sarah Steel made it abundantly clear that getting too comfortable was a bad idea. She may come home smiling and promise to take them to the park, but one wrong word out of his mouth could send him to bed with fresh bruises instead. It was a rookie mistake to let your guard down._

_“I don’t smell anything cooking,” Diamond adds, all playful chastisement._

_Juno rubs the back of his neck. “Ah, yeah. About that—”_

_They cut him off with a soft kiss. “Only kidding. Let’s go out to dinner. Get your coat, it’s chilly.” They turn back to the door, as if they expect Juno to fall into line immediately._

_“Well, about that—” Juno cuts himself off when he sees the tension in Diamond’s shoulders. They rap their knuckle on the wall by the empty hook and turn around._

_“Are you fucking kidding me? You seriously lost them again?”_

_“They’re around here somewhere! I got inside, didn’t I?” Juno winces at the defensiveness in his tone. Not helping, Steel._

_“Christ Juno. It’s not that hard.” They walk closer and Juno feels his pulse speed up. Diamond is staring at him with an intensity, searching his face for something._

_“I—” Juno isn’t even sure what he’s going to say, but Diamond doesn’t give him the chance anyway._

_“Are you high?” They demand as their voice shifts to a more dangerous tone. “Or are you just that stupid?”_

_“Of course I’m not high,” Juno snarls, burned by the low blow. “I haven’t touched that shit in a year and you know it.” Diamond had seen it all. All the ugly, desperate nights before he got clean. The withdrawals that got so bad he’d been hospitalized. How hard he's worked to **stay** clean. Not that they’d been any help through any of it, he thinks bitterly. “I was thinking about a case and I was distracted, alright?” he spits out. “And it’s my fucking car anyway!”_

_“Are you seriously talking back to me right now?” Their expression has morphed into something that makes Juno feel six years old again. He wants to run, wants to hide in the sewers, wants to make sure Ben is okay._

_Diamond’s in his face now and it’s too close, too close. He knows what’s coming, knows he can’t stop it—_

__  
__________

“Juno?” The hand on his shoulder makes him startle so violently he almost falls off the sofa. He scrambles to his feet, causing Small Fry to jump off his lap with an affronted sound, and tries to steady his breathing. 

Nuryev hovers nearby, brow creased. “Darling, are you okay?”

Juno attempts a small smile, but he’s pretty sure it comes out as a grimace. He pats his front and back pockets, and tries to look casual instead of frantic. “They’re around here somewhere. I mean, obviously. I’m sorry. I can find them, just give me a second.”

Nuryev takes a step forward and Juno backs up until he hits the wall. He’s still not making eye contact, and he can’t keep the panicked frustration out of his voice. “Christ! I said I was sorry, okay? Just—just calm down. I can’t _think_ when you’re like this.”

Nuryev stands completely still. “Like what?” He asks slowly. “Is this...is this about the keys? Sweetheart, I don’t care about that. We both know I can hotwire a car in seconds.” When he doesn’t get a response, he adds softly, “You know I’m not angry, right?”

Juno finally looks up and realizes there’s nothing but concern written across his face. He glances around, and sees that he’s not in that shithole in Old Town anymore. He’s in a decent apartment with someone who loves him, and he’s making an ass out of himself. 

He finds his way back to the couch and sinks onto it, pushing the blankets onto the floor. Small Fry hops back into his lap, and nestles her head against his chest. He leans his head back and rubs his eye. “Right. Right, I know. Just got in my head for a second, I guess.”

Nuryev sits next to him and crosses his legs, all practiced poise and grace. “Is there anything I can do?” 

Juno clears his throat and takes a deep, steadying breath.

_  
You’re always so dramatic_

_I wouldn’t have to do this if you weren’t so emotional_

_Maybe if you would shut up for a second  
_

“No. I’m fine,” Juno says, pointedly looking back to the stream. His voice doesn’t sound quite right, a little too flat, but at least it doesn’t come out choked.

“Juno, you don’t seem—”

“I said I’m _fine_ , dammit,” he snaps. “Stop trying to baby me and go do whatever you need to do.”

“Very well then,” he says. Juno may have bought into that cheery indifference before, but he’s able to hear the hint of hurt now.

He turns up the volume and tries not to think of anything at all. When the door shuts, Small Fry puts a paw on Juno’s chest, and the tilt of her head seems a little too knowing. He scratches under her chin softly and groans, “Yeah, I _know_.”

__________

“Jesus Juno, think you slammed the door hard enough?” Vespa growls out from the kitchen table. Juno tries to hide his full-body flinch. His hands were full and he’d used his hip to push the door shut behind him, with a little more force than he intended. He attempts to ground himself and wordlessly heads down the hallway.

“Fine then,” Vespa shouts after him, clearly thrown off kilter by this non-combative Juno. 

Nuryev is lounging on the bed, elegant as ever, as he scans over the floor plan for an upcoming job. Juno dumps the armful of weapons on the floor without greeting him, and turns back to the door. He visibly braces himself before he twists the knob slowly. He pulls the latch in completely as it turns, so it’s silent as it clicks into place. He keeps a steadying hand on it for a long moment. When he pulls away, there’s a barely audible sound that makes his whole body tense up.

“Darling, are you okay?” Nuryev calls over, peering over his reading glasses. 

Juno leans his back against the door and slides down silently, knees drawn up tight.

__________

__

_“What did I tell you about slamming that door, you little monster? I was sleeping for fucks’ sake.”_

_Juno is eight, and his arms are full of groceries he’s managed to swipe on his way home from school. He's barely able to open the front door, and isn’t thinking when he uses his foot to push it shut. The second he does it, before it even slams, he knows this is coming._

_Sarah Steel doesn’t keep to any particular schedule. Sometimes she doesn’t sleep for days. Sometimes she doesn't come home for days (Juno likes those days best). And other times, she doesn’t get **up** for days. _

_Which is inconvenient, since she sleeps on the ratty sofa in their one-bedroom flat._

_When she stomps toward him, eyes blazing, Juno immediately drops everything he’s holding. Cans of ravioli roll away, the milk bursts on the already-stained carpet. He has his hand on the door knob, he knows he needs to run, but her hand closes around his upper arm before he can open it._

_“Don’t even think about it,” she growls out. She yanks him forward by his arm (hard enough that the school nurse has to pop it back in place), and he braces himself—_

__  
__________

“Juno, are you with me?”

When he opens his eyes, he doesn’t see Benzaiten watching from their bedroom doorway, terrified and crying silently. He sees Nuryev, sitting cross legged in front of him.

He’s still trying to shake off the feeling of Sarah’s bony hands when Nuryev reaches out to gently touch his knee. “Get your fucking hands _off_ me,” he growls, moving further away. He pinches his nose, tries and fails to control his breathing. “I think I need to be alone for a minute.”

Nuryev rises to his feet, grabs his book off the side table and looks back, brow furrowed. “If you’re certain—”

“I just need you to get out off my face, alright?” Juno snaps, standing up and brushing off imaginary dirt. 

“Right,” he repeats, tonelessly. Juno immediately adds guilt to the emotional storm happening inside of him. 

Once he’s alone, he throws himself on the bed and curls up into a ball. If Ben were here, he would rest his head on his lap. He used to stroke Juno’s hair for _hours_ when he was scared or angry (or both). Tiny, gentle hands carding through his curls. Sometimes Ben read him stories, and other times he made them up. Those were always the best ones (even if they had to whisper and try to hold their giggles in).

He once told Nuryev that he wasn’t much of a sobber, but that wasn't entirely true.

Benzaiten had always cried easily. They spent many, many nights with Ben tucked under his arm, silently sobbing until Juno's shirt was soaked through and they could both finally fall asleep.

Juno would let himself get angry, punch walls until his knuckles bled, but crying seemed off limits. It felt like they couldn't both fall apart. Now he wonders if that's why Ben never seemed to get angry. If he thought he wasn’t allowed to.

Juno went back to the sewers about a week after he died, found his old hiding spot and sobbed until he threw up.

That was the first time in years, and the last time in years.

Now, he lets himself give in. He shakes and shakes and grips the pillow so tight he rips part of the case.

He can’t stop. 

Why can’t he _stop_?

Eventually he tires himself out, and feels his eyelids flutter close. He’s drifting in and out of consciousness when he feels a soft weight on the bed. He sits up slowly, and can’t imagine what a sight he makes. There’s no way his eye isn't bloodshot and red rimmed. He’s laying in bed with his _shoes on_ for Chrissake. He quickly kicks them off, chuckling humorlessly.

Nureyv isn’t looking at him with pity though. All Juno can read in his expression is warmth, and a bit of helplessness.

  
_What the fuck do you want from me, Juno?_

__

__

_I'm not the one that broke you_

_You have a meltdown any time I try to help_

_You’ve been like this since we were kids, Jay_

  


“Tell me what to do,” Nuryev says, all earnest sincerity.

“Can I—” Juno pauses.

_  
C’mon, Super Steel_

_You can tell me anything_

_I promise  
_

He swallows. Ben can’t be here, but he still has someone in his corner.

“Can I lay my head on your lap?”

Relief passes over Nuryev's face, and something in Juno's chest unfurls a bit. Nuryev puts a pillow in his lap, and gently runs his fingers through Juno's curls. Juno lets his eye close and focuses only on the soft sensation. His hands are different from Ben’s—of course they are—but the feeling is so wonderfully _Nuryev_. Controlled, gentle movements. Fluid, intentional tenderness. 

“I love you,” Juno says, abruptly breaking the heavy silence. He opens his eye as Nuryev’s hands still. Those bright, honest eyes stare down at him. 

They’ve said it before, more than once. But it feels different, somehow, in this context. In this vulnerable, human moment.

Nuryev’s eyes somehow soften even more— _the sap _—and Juno closes his own again. Nuryev leans down and kisses the top of his head, whispers it back into his hair.__

____

____

Juno will eventually tell him about Diamond, about his childhood, about how one affected the other. But for now, he'll just let himself feel loved.

**Author's Note:**

> yeahhhh I know space doors go swoosh, but doors slamming are a trigger for me so they get to be a trigger for juno huzzah


End file.
